Superior Visible Photoelectric Response with Au/Cu2NiSnS4 Core-Shell Nanocrystals

Anima Ghosh; Shyam Narayan Singh Yadav; Ming-Hsiu Tsai; Abhishek Dubey; Chih-Ting Lin; Shangjr Gwo; Ta-Jen Yen

doi:10.1021/acsami.3c17462

Superior Visible Photoelectric Response with Au/Cu₂NiSnS₄ Core-Shell Nanocrystals

ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2024 Mar 6;16(9):12033-12041. doi: 10.1021/acsami.3c17462. Epub 2024 Feb 26.

Authors

Anima Ghosh^{1

2}, Shyam Narayan Singh Yadav³, Ming-Hsiu Tsai⁴, Abhishek Dubey³, Chih-Ting Lin⁴, Shangjr Gwo^{5

6}, Ta-Jen Yen³

Affiliations

¹ Institute of Atomic and Molecular Sciences, Academia Sinica, Taipei 106, Taiwan R.O.C.
² Department of Physics, School of Sciences and Humanities, SR University, Warangal 506371, India.
³ Department of Materials Science and Engineering, National Tsing Hua University, No. 101 Section 2, Kuang Fu Road, Hsinchu City 300, Taiwan R.O.C.
⁴ Graduate Institute of Electronics Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei 106, Taiwan, R.O.C.
⁵ Department of Physics, National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu City 300, Taiwan R.O.C.
⁶ Research Centre for Applied Science, Academia Sinica, Taipei 115, Taiwan R.O.C.

Abstract

The incorporation of plasmonic metal nanostructures into semiconducting chalcogenides in the form of core-shell structures provides a promising approach to enhancing the performance of photodetectors. In this study, we combined Au nanoparticles with newly developed copper-based chalcogenides Cu₂NiSnS₄ (Au/CNTS) to achieve an ultrahigh optoelectronic response in the visible regime. The high-quality Au/CNTS core-shell nanocrystals (NCs) were synthesized by developing a unique colloidal hot-injection method, which allowed for excellent control over sizes, shapes, and elemental compositions. The as-synthesized Au/CNTS hybrid core-shell NCs exhibited enhanced optical absorption, carrier extraction efficiency, and improved photosensing performance owing to the plasmonic-induced resonance energy transfer effect of the Au core. This effect led to a significant increase in the carrier density of the Au/CNTS NCs, resulting in a measured responsivity of 1.2 × 10³ AW^-1, a specific detectivity of 6.2 × 10¹¹ Jones, and an external quantum efficiency of 3.8 × 10⁵ % at an incident power density of 318.5 μW cm^-2. These results enlighten a new era in the development of plasmonic core-shell nanostructure-based visible photodetectors.

Keywords: chalcogenides; colloidal hot-injection methods; core−shell nanocrystals; hybrid photodetectors; light-matter interactions.